What is the DNA of the Melungeon people?
The Melungeon DNA Project is a genetic study started in 2005 by the private company Family Tree DNA of people with identified Melungeon ancestors (according to historic records), mostly residing in Hancock County, Tennessee and people with ancestors identified as Carmel Indians who lived in nearby areas of Kentucky.
What ethnicity is Black Dutch?
The most common designation of “Black Dutch” refers to Dutch immigrants to New York who had swarthier complexions than most other Dutch. The darker complexions were usually due to intermarriage or out of wedlock births with Spanish soldiers during the Spanish occupation of the Netherlands.
What is the meaning of Melungeon?
Definition of Melungeon sometimes offensive. : one of a group of people of uncertain ancestry in the southern Appalachians especially of eastern Tennessee.
Is Black Dutch Gypsy?
Tziganes, or more commonly but erroneously called Gypsies, are another group called Black Dutch in America. This group is mistakenly thought to come from Egypt. These are called Bohemians (as in La Boheme) because they were thought to be from what is now the Czech Republic.
What does a Black Dutch person look like?
“There are strong indications that the original “Black Dutch” were swarthy-complexioned Germans. Anglo-Americans loosely applied the term to any dark-complexioned American of European descent. The term was adopted [by some people] as an attempt to disguise Indian or infrequently, tri-racial descent.
What tribe is Black Dutch?
Some Cherokee & Chickasaw Indians are called Black Dutch. Black Dutch may be one and the same with Pennsylvania Germans who migrated in the area of Pennsylvania as a group. They say they are from ‘Deutsche,’ which sounds like the pronunciation of ‘Dutch, ‘ which actually means ‘German ‘ in their own language.
Is Melungeon a Native American tribe?
Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own. The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent.
Are Melungeons tri-racial?
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200. The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject.
How do you identify a Melungeon?
Others believe they have certain “characteristic” physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon. For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians.
What is a Melungeon in Virginia?
The term Melungeon was traditionally considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachian whites who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry, though who were not clearly either “black” or “Indian”. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race.